Page 114 of The Vet from Snowy River
Now, she could admire the neat square of park she’d learned was the beating heart of this town. The pretty buildings with their wrought-iron railings, the tubs of flowers that the council maintained on the footpaths. Lake Bogong shimmered beneath the mountains in the early morning sun, and the heavenly smell of coffee beans hung in the air.
Her coffee beans … being ground lovingly by Graeme and served up to a string of faithful customers.
She was ready, she thought. She was feeling, finally, a little of that peace and wholeness that Marigold had spoken of at Jill’s funeral.
She was ready, finally, to go see Josh.
CHAPTER
36
‘That end, up two inches,’ said Josh, standing back from the cabinetry he’d spent the last six hours constructing.
Sweat had pooled under Hannah’s armpits, and she looked cranky as a wombat who’d lost her burrow. ‘I’m going to drop this thing any second now, hotshot. Screw it in already, I don’t care if it’s lopsided.’
‘Think of the calories you’ll be able to consume afterwards, Hannah Banana.’
The counter looked good. Real good. And damn if it didn’t give him a little rush to see his own design for the clinic’s new reception coming to life. They’d be able to open the door again to their furred and feathered patients in a day or two … so long as that business renewal didn’t get botched up by another malicious complaint.
His building permit reassessment still hadn’t been resolved either, despite the objection he’d lodged and the letters of support he’d collected from the residents of Hanrahan he’d approached, and Maureen was taking her own sweet time with the renovation story he and Kev had drip-fed her.
Hannah was like a cat on a hot tin roof worrying about what council would or wouldn’t do for them, but at least he had a nail gun and an impressive set of hammers handy to help him work through his own angst.
He took pity on his sister and reached under the cabinet top she was holding to screw its bolts into the backboard.
‘You can let it go now.’
‘Thank god for that. You’re no fun to work for, Josh Cody, I can tell you that much.’
‘Step back and see what you think.’
Hannah moved back beside him and they both looked over the rebuilt interior of their business. Laminate wood flooring gleamed under their feet. The receptionist desk he’d lengthened, so files and charts could be kept below bench height in a series of sliding drawers, rather than stuffed in the old shelves in the back hall.
The cabinet doors he’d scrounged from the rubbish dump and pulled apart, sanded, remade. Tasmanian oak, he’d bet his toolbelt on it, and they looked a million bucks beneath the milk-white countertop Hannah had chosen.
Their practising certificates had survived the fire and were back up on the new wall behind the counter, framed in thin copper frames. He rested his eyes on the other certificate hanging there and felt his jaw tighten. The renewal would come through. It just had to.
The police had minimal luck so far wresting answers out of Pamela Hogan. She’d claimed client confidentiality, which had totally sucked, and the council were equally unhelpful, refusing to name the complainant.
‘Put an orchid in a pot and we could be on the front cover ofHouse Beautiful.’
He pushed their pressing array of problems aside and grinned at Hannah. ‘Is that admiration I’m hearing in your voice?’
She wrapped her arm around him and butted her head into his shoulder. ‘It was a lucky day for me when you decided to bring your new vet skills home to Hanrahan, Josh. I mean it.’
Well, shoot. ‘It was always my plan to come home, Han. Just took me a little longer to get it done than I’d first thought.’
‘You’re here now.’
Yeah. He was. He’d got it all, all he’d set out to get. A family, albeit a slightly lopsided one, settled back in Hanrahan. A vet practice, community, clean mountain air. Him, Poppy and—if Parker was onboard with Poppy’s puppy-switch plan—Jane Doe.
It was the dream he’d kept in his head all those years working construction in the city. Only, why did it seem unfinished?
The arsonist was still on the loose … yeah, that was a biggie. The local council had been as supportive as a wet tissue.
He sighed as his thoughts circled back to where they began each day.Vera.
When had she snuck her way into his dream for the future? Not that she wanted to be: she’d been like a thorn, poking and snarling holes into his golden-eyed view of what could have been.
